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<title>The Other Laurel's Laurels by Emmeebee</title>
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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/22456843">The Other Laurel's Laurels</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/Emmeebee/pseuds/Emmeebee'>Emmeebee</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Arrow (TV 2012)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Drabble, Gen, Introspection</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-01-29</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-01-29</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-04-28 16:34:12</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>259</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/22456843</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/Emmeebee/pseuds/Emmeebee</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Earth-2's Laurel reflects on her Earth-1 counterpart. Set during season 7.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>7</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>The Other Laurel's Laurels</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Laurel knows it’s insane to be jealous of a dead woman. After years where her sole concern was survival, nothing is more important to her than making it through each day. How can she feel in any way lacking when she has what it takes to keep herself alive and the other Laurel didn’t? No matter what Felicity, Dinah and their friends may think, she’s clearly the most capable version of herself.</p>
<p>Yet she can’t help it. Whenever someone talks about the accomplishments of this Earth’s Laurel, she feels... grief — shame? It has been so long since she allowed herself to feel those emotions that it’s difficult to name them.</p>
<p>If it weren’t for that drunk driver — if it weren’t for her father forgetting the cake — if it weren’t for Laurel acting like a brat... would this have been her? Would she have been a hero, protecting people by day as a prosecutor and by night as the Black Canary? Would she have been willing to die to save others?</p>
<p>Or would she still have fallen short? Is there something inside of her that would have turned her into a villain no matter what? Would this Earth’s Laurel always have been kinder, better-liked, more successful?</p>
<p>She will never know for sure, and she doesn’t know if she even wants to.</p>
<p>Would it be better to know that she wouldn’t have, and that in a childish tantrum she’d not only killed her father but thrown away her future, or that she has something within her that inherently makes her villainous?</p>
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